Reports: Obama Delivers Boehner New Offer On Fiscal Crisis

Citing sources close to the debt talks, both the New York Times and The Associated Press are reporting that President Obama has delivered a new offer to House Speaker John Boehner to resolve the fiscal crisis.

The new plan would "raise revenues by $1.2 trillion over the next decade but keep in place the Bush-era tax rates for any household with earnings below $400,000," reports the Times.

The response from the president came after a 45-minute meeting Monday with the speaker at the White House.

The AP had this analysis of the proposed offer:

"Obama's willingness to reduce future cost-of-living increases in Social Security and numerous other government programs marked a clear a concession to Boehner, although it came with an asterisk. The president wants lower-income recipients to receive protection against any loss from scaling back future cost-of-living increases, these officials said.

"Nor did Obama's offer include raising the age of Medicare eligibility from 65 to 67, a Republican goal that has drawn particularly strong objections from Democratic liberals."

NPR's Julie Rovner tells our Newscast unit that though it seems Boehner finally seems ready to deal on at least some tax increases, it's not clear whether he can get the votes he'll need from the rest of his House Republicans.

"Likewise, while the president seems willing to deal on Medicare and Social Security, many Democrats say they won't vote for that," Rovner says.

The offer, which has not been independently verified by NPR, is said to be similar to the one Boehner offered on Friday. The officials told the Times that the speaker will present the plan to House Republicans on Tuesday morning, and that "both sides are cautiously optimistic that a major deficit reduction plan could be passed well before January."

The January deadline is when more than a half-trillion dollars in automatic tax increases and spending cuts will go into effect.